Dear Mike and Leah,
I’m just a never-in housewife and long time scientology watcher who has been a huge fan of Leah and the K of Q since day one. The integrity of Aftermath is obvious. I have watched every episode several times and I cry everytime. I fell in love with each one of your guests; the Kahns, the Reisdorfs, the Headleys, Aaron, Amy, Ron & Becky. The real and raw emotions of the Aftermath participants are undeniable. Real people cry differently than actors on scripted shows do. Actors are busy showing their faces and innunciating. Thank you for bringing us their moving, timeless stories, I hope to hear positive updates and good things about all of them. Its not much, but I am making a dontation today to congratulate you on the Emmy nomination. Mike, you rock!!!

Do the D level “celebs” they give a stage to get paid? Do they get commissions when they play at IAS events?

Sorry to be so naïve. I’ve either not paid attention or perhaps it’s not common knowledge. Apparently the self-conceived “big wig” IAS helpers are all there for the commish, but I hadn’t considered whether the singers, magicians, and speakers were getting paid too.

Cincinnati is supposedly seeking “teachers and nannies”…..God help THOSE kids. WHAT are the “qualifications” to apply for one of these jobs, besides “enlisting” in COS? Does one even NEED a “college degree” to work for COS as a teacher or nanny….oh yes…what about the fact that MOST legit schools REQUIRE criminal background AND CPS background checks…..along with a LEGIT college degree.

Does one simply walk in the door of this facility, resume in hand, and say “I am here to apply for the teaching/nanny position I saw advertised”…….and THEN what happens..(as IF I didn’t already know).

Let’s see now….pay??? (I am beginning to laugh)…..Benefits?? (laughing harder now)…Hours???(laughing to the point of tears streaming down my face)…….

Quentin Strub and Chandler Mogel – Another pair of complete and utter unknowns except within the shrinking bubble that is $camology.

Michael Chan and the equines: Shouldn’t there be big piles of steaming brown poo under the horses?

What is an ideal eternity? A library with every book from all over the universe and being able read them. With coffee of course.
Can you see it from the front porch of infinity? No, it’s so far in the infinite eternity that it’s infinitely impossible to see.

“…Russell Mellor who has RECOVERED thousands of…” See, I told that they were time travelling furniture/people restorers. He’s come back to spray a fresh layer of $camology kaka on them.

Congratulations to Leah and Mike on your Emmy nomination. God bless you both for the wonderful work you are doing revealing the cruelty and abuses committed by the Church of Scientology and David Miscavige. When does season two of Aftermath start? Keep up the good work and saving people from this abusive scam.

I am absolutely horrified by the use of that young girl with disabilities as well as the gentleman in the wheel chair in the Columbus morgue. As a mother of a young man with intellectual disabilities – and in Australia – I have had to fight tooth and nail for the support we have received from the Government. Do not get me wrong I am GRATEFUL for it. It is just the thought of these precious funds being swindled by the bottomless pit that is scientology – would that young girl even UNDERSTAND sciloon concepts? I do not get it and i have been reading anti – scientology blogs for years. Where are the advocates for these people? Why are the Governments not stepping in?

Almost at the end of rant…

My understanding – and correct me if i am wrong – is that people with disabilities are rated as worthless in sciloon speak? What are they implying – that in the NEXT lifetime these people will be mainstream only if they follow sciloon garbage? I hope and pray that this is not the case – if it is, then these parents need their faces rearranged. I would gladly do it.

I totally agree with you – my grandson has CP, autism & short gut…I asked about handicap ppl in CoS & elderly and both are considered a drain & are shuffled off somewhere to die. I was told that LRH stated CoS “enables the able”…Anyone else causes down stats & are a financial drain & have even been encouraged to shed their bodies now…so they can be recycled into a new better, more able next life. Disgusting….

Barbet, thankyou for your response. It was just as I thought. I truly hope that there are not parents out there that are neglecting their precious kids, because they believe this. Just breaks my heart into a million pieces 🙁

When a person bought a book or some form of service from SCN and then never returns to “go up the bridge” they have to be recovered, meaning someone calling them or writing them and persuading them to get back into SCN so they can empty their wallets.

Note: “Calling them or writing them thousands of times”. It’s quite unlikely that he has “recovered” thousands…or even hundreds. If so, org stats would be rising rather than tanking. And since he cannot prove the statement nor can we disprove it, it’s a specious claim. ANYTHING to get people to come to his talk!

As I noted in a comment to John P., below, I think it is a typical Scientology “acceptable truth” implying much more than it actually means – I suspect he has tracked down thousands of people who had moved and changed phone numbers without the orgs managing to keep up like they usually do, finding their current information and then gotten a very few of those back on services. They seem to have a big push on to try to track down and contact everyone in their files, presumably because there is virtually no more “raw meat” coming in their doors.

Precisely true. No matter what you might have bought or read, no matter if you only did some intro course and then left, you are always and forever considered “a scientologist” and open for more regging. I left in ’82 and, despite several moves, I am still getting written promo. I no longer ask them to stop as the recycle bin is on the way back from the mailbox!

Hmm, a definite outpoint spotted. No pix of David and Shelly holding hands and smiling into each others eyes…hmmm…

Well, for starters, that would be because – they hate each other! …Um..no,, that’s out PR…Hmmm, lets see…Got it! Its a logistics thing!…no, that’s no good. Can’t open THAT can of worms……OK (whew!), HERE’S an acceptable truth for ‘ya, jgg2012,

“This loving, long married couple’s mutual and total dedication to the Purposes of the Scientology Religion cause them to lead very separate lives.”

How’s that, huh? OSA, what do you think? Can I be your CultSpokeshole? I heard there’s an opening.

Possibly the rules prevent any PDA……”Public Displays (of) Affection…….We all know that Shelley has been sent out of the country on that “top secret still under warps mission” to clear the planet & she’s going to be away a lllooonnngggg time….days, weeks, months..a year….umm, aahh….perhaps YEARS.
Hey, clearing this ENTIRE planet is no easy task, but she’s a tough ole’ girl….she should be able to do it in maybe…..???? Hey Dave, say Hi to Shelley from everyone…wherever she is.

When did “achieving status” become more important to the CoS than providing services to actually going “clear” and getting people “up the Bridge”? Seems a lot of the promos feature fundraising for the “IAS”. At least with services, there’s an exchange and some form of measurable progress… unless of course, you count the trophies as an achievement.

According to my own observations, it was in 2003 that status surpassed audting and training in importance. By the time I left, about 6 years ago, no one was pushing public for auditing or training, whereas before 2003, in my org at least, there had been a decided push from the regges to buy services. This shift in importance, from the purchase of services to the purchases of status was the main reason I made plans to leave. I knew my org was off policy and out tech with Ideal Org Fundraising and intense emphasis on IAS statuses. At the time I thought it was just my org, but when I started reading Marty’s blog I realized that it was not just my org but systemic.

Congrats to You, Leah, the producers and crew. Aftermath is nominated for an Emmy.
OUTSTANDING INFORMATIONAL SERIES OR SPECIAL
Seems to me that the Tiny Tyrant of the oft mentioned cult might be having a bad day.?

Love Thursday Funnies and look forward to them. Wondering about the horses (again) too. And, what does Mt. Rushmore have to do with Kansas City, MO? (I do realize they are talking about founders, but it’s such an odd graphic choice for KC). Lastly, you’d think of all words for Co$ to misspell, supporters wouldn’t be one of them! KAW – Keep Aftermath Working!

C’mon now….let’s be realistic here….we damned well KNOW that there is PLENTY of space for another “face” to be added in between all those former Presidents….perhaps they could manage to squeeze in the bust of LRH…..naaahh…..I think DM would want HIS face up there…

A Diamond, this is the cult’s pathetic attempt to “position” Scientology with well known and widely respected US Presidents carved in stone for all eternity. Positioning is an effective and frequently used advertising tool but in this case I don’t think it will do the trick.

Next they might try positioning LRH or David Miscavige with Jesus Christ…oh, wait, they’ve already done that, sort of. The Scientology cross, on top of Flag and possible all Ideal Morgue buildings. Yes, a cross so the buildings are positioned with Christian churches; meanwhile, all Scientologists will be taught at some point that there was no Jesus Christ…funny. You’ve got to hand it to them for nerve!

I mean seriously? How much longer can these ‘still-ins’ take all the fundraising and Saint Hill Size b.s.

They’ve been saying it for years and years now with not a single Ideal Org let alone one that is SHS. How do these people not finally just snap everytime they hear or read the words ‘Ideal Org’ and Saint Hill Size. I would have throat punched a FSM by now.

Perhaps those horses should have blinders on them and they’re a metaphor for every poor sap still caught up in this scam.

The A&E show could not have been as POWEFUL without the HELP of people like YOU Mary Kahn, whose brave precious few minutes will go down in history as one HELL of a heart-achingly true story of what’s really going on inside the “bubble”

I have a HUGE hat pin my Grandma left me….I mean this Hat Pin is HUGE…..I would love to have the opportunity to USE it to burst that friggin’ Bubble!

I just watched the link and burst into tears. I suddenly actually realised they tried to destroy my family – and were NOT successful.
Of course I knew mentally and financially what they were trying to do to us….but I just actually really realised that we have not only survived and grown even closer, we have succeeded in all areas of our lives, far beyond anyone in the church would want us too! ????

Hey Mike, I’m an ex-scn and I first wanted to say thank you for all that you are doing to speak out against the church. I wanted to leave a comment however- I’ve noticed that in some of your headers on pictures (particularly the Thursday Funnies) you blog degrades or make fun of how people look (“Bad Hair” as an example for this week). I’ve seen a few examples of this, and I just wanted to call out that making fun of people isn’t really funny, particularly when it comes to the way someone looks. I understand that the intention is all fun, but I think we should also remember that a lot of Scientologists are victims of a cult, and an “outsider” making fun of them doesn’t really help anything. I know if I was still in Scn. and I saw this blog making fun of me, it would just pull me in tighter with the church. Just my two cents, and like I mentioned again, thank you for all that you’re doing.

Thanks and agreed. The bad hair day is a long running bit – it started out as a commentary about their ridiculous inability to use photoshop so they cut out people’s hair to look like cardboard. It was not about the looks of the person but about how the low quality graphics work made them look terrible.

Sometimes, the small nuggets are the most revealing. In the badly done “Flag Ideal Org Alliance Convention” brochure (which appears to be a quickly typed e-mail instead of a professionally produced glossy brochure, they promise a presentation from Russel Mellor, “who has recovered THOUSANDS of Scientologists back onto the Bridge.”

I’m guessing that a “recovery specialist” is the Scientology equivalent of a “repo man,” the guy who goes around in the middle of the night and resorts to violence, threats of violence or other underhanded means to repossess cars whose owners have prematurely stopped making payments.

But for Russel, whose parents apparently couldn’t afford the second “L” in his first name, the numbers don’t add up. If he recovered thousands of people who were so glad to see the error of their ways after his entreaties, then a significant percentage, perhaps even a majority of currently practicing Scientologists, were recovered after leaving the cult. After all, there are probably fewer than 10,000 practicing Scientologists in the US (excluding staff & Sea Org).

Either that or his recovery efforts didn’t stick — people allowed themselves to be recovered for a couple months and then remembered exactly why they left in the first place. In which case, Mellor has failed as a “recovery specialist” when they didn’t stay recovered, leaving me to wonder why I should want to hear anything he has to say.

Or maybe, just maybe, the numbers are exaggerated just as they are for so much else concerning the success of Scientology. Again, why would I want to see a guy talk who, after decades of effort, only dragged a couple dozen people kicking and screaming back into the cult?

Chris Shelton was on a SO mission to recover people for some time. He was good at it and did recover some. It also helped wake him up – he saw empty orgs and unfulfilled promises as he traveled around on the mission. He realized the ideal org business is a scam because of what he saw on his travels.

wow, that’s pretty cool. I’ve not kept up on how many missions get fired in, or how many “advance teams” arrive for outer org events. When I was staff, we had the lanyards and braid in town on a regular basis. (Missionaires were there to rip people off post and destroy group cohesion and morale)

I wonder if this is a common disease these days, ….. can’t send anyone on tour because they then see everywhere is empty, struggling, and failing?

John P., that’s an interesting one to pick up on. As people may have noticed, I always eye these trying to figure out how their claims relate to the underlying reality – and I think I’m starting to get the hang of parsing the particular, peculiar ways that Scientologists try to lie through statistics and misleading partial truths.

Thousands does indeed not make sense, so my guess is that the stat includes people whose contact information had been lost, who were tracked down, put back on mailing lists and even called – there are reports of a lot of that these days – along with a small number who actually really became active again on “the bridge.”

Speaking of deception, I feel sorry for any teachers and nannies lured in by that one ad, who will almost surely discover that the imagined surge of students needing childcare during courses never materializes, and instead they spend most of their time reassigned to tasks like writing letters to people who bought a book decades ago….

They’ll have “proportionate pay plan” explained in hopeful terms and eyes glowing with fervor envisioning the explosion of money due in our pockets – just around the corner when we ACHIEVE OLD SAINT HILL SIZE! It doesn’t have to take a long time, and you’ll be a KEY part of it!! Duty is the highest motivation!!

Ha! People can’t join staff because they have to work to pay for their kids’ schooling at a non-wog school? Can’t join up because you can’t afford a day-long nanny?

Yes Dude, you’re got them pegged, desperate indeed! Organised Scientology produces the concentration camp of the mind. To imagine being a staff member in a “modern Ideal Org” is akin to volunteering to be a guard walking the wire to keep the victims in, but never understanding why what your seniors say equals what you see. I wonder what the percentage of completed staff contracts is these days? I’d guess well below 10%.
I use to be impressed with Scientology’s graphics years ago, the 4 color brochures and graphics were of good and expensive quality. Today its very poorly produced computer dribble. It’s badly written desktop publishing by an extreme amateur churning out crap to please equally amateur seniors. Michael Chan’s one looks like how I feel after a night out with the boys.

Important Quotes

If the org slumps during this transition period, don't engage in "fund raising"
or "selling postcards" or borrowing money. Just make more income with Scientology.
L Ron Hubbard From HCOPL URGENT ORG PROGRAMMING

"We own a tremendous amount of property. We own a tremendous amount of material and so forth, and it keeps growing.
But that’s not important. When buildings get important to us, for God sakes, some of you born revolutionists will you please blow up central headquarters".
L Ron Hubbard Lecture 31 Dec 1960

"Personal integrity is knowing what you know. What you know is what you know and to have the courage to know and say what you have observed".- LRH from Personal Integrity

"It is necessary to happiness of man, that he be mentally faithful to himself. Infidelity does not consist in believing, or in disbelieving; it consists of professing to believe what he does not believe." Thomas Paine

“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.” - Martin Luther King

“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.” - Martin Luther King

“There comes a time when silence is betrayal.” - Martin Luther King Jr.

“Communication is the universal solvent” - L Ron Hubbard

“When men yield up the privilege of thinking, the last shadow of liberty quits the horizon.” Thomas Paine

"Never be afraid to raise your voice for honesty and truth and compassion against injustice and lying and greed. If people all over the world would do this, it would change the earth." William Faulkner

"The ultimate authority must always rest with the individual's own reason and critical analysis." Dalai Lama